Contract Ratified by a 94% "YES" Vote

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8/4/16

Colleagues:

I'm proud to announce that the 25,000 faculty and professional staff represented by PSC will receive long-overdue raises because an overwhelming 94 percent majority of PSC members voted to ratify the new PSC-CUNY contract.

The agreement provides 10.41 percent in compounded salary increases over a period of slightly more than seven years, from October 20, 2010 through November 30, 2017. The raises will be retroactive to April 20, 2012 and will be paid to employees who worked at CUNY between then and now even if they have retired or left CUNY. The contract includes more than three times the back pay originally offered by CUNY, won because PSC members stood up to management and to Albany. (Use this online tool to estimate your retroactive pay.)

It took a militant, public campaign and strike authorization vote to win the salary increases. At the same time, the campaign built the leverage needed to negotiate breakthrough provisions on adjunct job security, full-time faculty workload, and other gains that will improve teaching and learning conditions at CUNY. It also includes a signing bonus for current employees.

A record-breaking 72 percent of eligible voters participated in the contract ratification vote. The level of engagement is unprecedented in PSC ratification votes; it is a testament to our shared vision of a better university and evidence of your commitment to member-to-member organizing.

The contract consolidates gains won by the union between the expiration of the last contract in 2010 and the end of the most recent negotiations--including adjunct health insurance on the NYC plan, paid parental leave, and increased funding for faculty research grants. It also introduces a new provision for multi-year appointments for eligible teaching adjuncts at CUNY. The health insurance and multi-year appointments represent major steps toward greater professionalism and equity in the treatment of adjuncts, providing increased stability for academic departments and guaranteed income and accrued sick days for adjuncts on three-year appointments. More than 86 percent of adjunct faculty who took part in the ratification vote voted "yes."

In addition, the full-time faculty now have a contractual commitment and a timetable to restructure the teaching load to ensure that they have the time to mentor students and to conduct research. Professional staff in "non-promotional" HEO titles have gained opportunities for advances in pay and title.

Thank you for organizing, turning out to dozens of rallies, attending news conferences and lobby days, and most fundamentally, thank you for sticking together during this very difficult fight. I also want to offer my sincere thanks to the other PSC officers and the union staff, without whose unwavering support and work this contract would not have been possible. There is much more to do to make CUNY the university that its students, faculty and professional staff deserve, but because of your activism, the PSC is well positioned to continue this important work.